IF IT MOVES ­ SHOOT

By Lewis Barton

Extracted from Flying Saucer Review Vol. 1 No. 3, 1955, p.11

….this extract from the Newsletter of C.R.I.F.O (Civilian Research, Interplanetary Flying Objects), of Ohio. It concerns the sighting of an U.F.O. by four men who were together on watch in the Rockford area of Illinois. They sent in a report to the Filter Centre in Chicago. “Within minutes,” records the Newsletter, “jets were up on an intercept mission and, according to the G.O.C. members, fired on the mysterious object, causing it to explode. Before the explosion, however, G.O.C. reported that a small round object shot out of the side of the ‘parent’ device, then, in horizontal flight, passed up the jets, after which it was seen to turn on edge and disappear straight up into the sky.”  The report adds that Air Force personnel moved in quickly and warned the G.O.C. members to say nothing about the incident. “However, earlier, the local Civil Defence Chief of the area did report the ‘firing’ to the local press ­ who, in turn, explained away the affair by stating that jets had fired on a ‘balloon’.” A stupid explanation, I suggest, because why on earth should jets need to fire on a balloon?

I found one reference in Keyhoe’s book, Flying Saucers: Top Secret on Page 43;

For 1955

In April, Air Force jets fired on a UFO circling a weather balloon near Rockford, Illinois. With a footnote which only states that a signed report and press account were in the NICAP files.